Chicago Reader review:This
enduring 1946 Technicolor fantasy by Michael Powell and Emeric
Pressburger began as a propaganda piece meant to cement wobbly
British-American postwar relations, and some of that theme survives,
notably in the climactic trial scene set in heaven. But the rest is
given over to a delirious romanticism, tinged with morbidity, mysticism,
and humor. David Niven is the British fighter pilot who misses his
appointment with death, falling in love with a Wac (Kim Hunter) on his
borrowed time. Powell had more and bigger ideas than any other postwar
British director: his use of color and bold graphic images is startling
and exhilarating, as is his willingness to explore the subsidiary themes
of Pressburger's screenplay, never sacrificing creative excitement to
linear plot. And yet, for all its abstraction, the film remains
emotionally specific and affecting. With Roger Livesey and Marius
Goring.Dave KehrHere (and above) is the opening to the film.